Meat Sandwich 5778 (1838)
Wednesday, October 4, 2006-10:00 P.M.
It's another rainy night in Rochester, but so nice to be home. I rolled in at around 2:30 Monday morning, after 18 1/2 hours in the car.
Friday's show in St. Cloud, Minnesota, was absolutely excellent. The room was full, and except for a table up front that was having table conversations that were disturbing people around them, everything went fine. There was a guest spot kid who went up before me, and they let him do 15 minutes....only problem was he never did comedy before, so all of his material was absolutely untested. He got nothing out of the crowd, and I felt bad for him, because he was a nice guy, brought people with him, and resisted all of my attempts to tell him not to do standup....that's real committment.
Saturday was a different animal...same table, different trouble table. This one was four divorcees in their 40's, who felt they had to tag every joke with a comment, funny or not. One woman got mad and threw a piece of pizza at me. She was being a total crotch. The headliner, Dave Nickerson, gave them hell and then finally asked them if they shouldn't leave. "If you're not having a good time, why are you staying? You're wrecking the show for everyone in here!" It was ugly and unnecessary, and the room wasn't that full to begin with. It was kind of a punk way to end the tour, but you don't get to call your shots, you take them as they come.
Sunday morning got off to a bad start...I wound up driving around like a hummingbird trying to find route 94 that would send me east. When I finally found it, even though I kept crossing bridges that took me over the expressway, I couldn't find the on-ramp, and that's because the on-ramp was fed from an access road, and you had to drive almost a mile perpendicular to the highway to get to it, and then drive back. It was plenty weird.
The next thing I had to deal with was the rising sun shining right into my eyes. I wear prescription glasses, and can never find clip-on sunglasses, so I was pretty blind until noon. I was sweating it out as I headed toward Chicago because I knew they were playing at home and didn't want to get harried by stadium traffic, but come to find out they weren't playing until late, and I wasn't going anywhere near the stadium. Thank God for small favors.
Speaking of acts of God, as I came out of Madison, Wisconsin and south through the towns of Janesville and Beloit, I stopped for gas, only to notice that the I-94 was backing up something terrible. I was happy not to be caught in that traffic, and the clerk at the gas station let me know that they were repairing a bridge on 94 that cut the traffic down to one lane, and that I needed to take a detour (not a posted detour, by the way) and it still took me 45 minutes to an hour, but at least I kept moving.
I survived the long drive due to a couple of tapes I picked up at a truckstop...Jimmy Buffet Live, and George Carlin Live. The Carlin tape was actually the show he was doing while I toured with him as an assistant to the Road Manager back in 1995-1997. It was neat to hear how the material evolved from this early taping, to what it eventually became. Also, I didn't realize what a parrothead I had the capacity to become...I played that tape over 'n' over again, I must have every little bit of "between song patter" memorized. I must remember next time to pack some music a little more thoroughly than I did on this tour (which means I didn't bring any).
When I drive, I usually pass a whole lot of cars and trucks, it's just the way I do it. I was pretty cautious though, what with it being the beginning of the month (quotas for speeding tickets) and I wasn't interested in buying some little town's new stop sign. I passed a couple of livestock trucks transporting pigs, and I could see their little snouts and tails sticking out of the vents in the side of the truck. I went quickly from being entertained at their little piggy antics to being consumed by horror as I saw what I assume to be their final destination...a Hormel meat packing plant. I didn't see the plant right away, but there were signs for the Spam museum, and I was interested to see what that looked like...when I looked off the exit, there was the plant, and my heart got a little heavy.
Now, I know where meat comes from, I'm not delusional. And I'm a meat-eater, even though my wife is a moral vegetarian. But I'm not going to lie to you and tell you that seeing a couple of trucks of animals that were surely being taken to slaughter didn't affect me in a bad way. I was choked up and unhappy for several miles. I think that the physical process of driving for such a long time (and with little sleep, I might add) takes it's toll on me and my ability to control my emotions. I get all weepy over nothing after I've been in the car for 9 hours or more, and it's getting worse in my old age.
Now, just to prove to you that I'm not a big crybaby sissy, I'll tell you another story. Later that evening, I was on line at Burger King at an Ohio rest stop (yeah, I got the Whopper combo). I was third in line at the only register open, manned by a largely uninterested young man who's demeanor and speech made me think "community theater" right away.
So I'm in line, and what looks like an army of Gypsies, or Eastern Europeans of some designation, come descending on the rest stop, and suddenly, there's 20 people or more in line. A young man, looking all of maybe 10 years old, but visibly brandishing his own money, asks the old man in front of me if he can get behind him. The old man shrugs, and the kid takes his place in line IN FRONT OF ME.
Now, that's not the way cuts work. I'm not saying that Gypsies or Romanians or whatever these people were don't play by the rules, but clearly, this young man never got the rules. So the old man steps up, places his order, and he needs some change, so he asks the kid for it. Well, they're together, I guess, it's his grandfather or somebody from on the same bus. And that's what Community Theater thought, too, because after the old man paid, he looked at me and said "Can I take your order?"
Now, I'm plenty road weary at this point, been in the car for about 12 hours and still have around six to go. I put my order in, and then the kid chastises me and says, "Hey, I was next!"
Now, in my head, I'm thinking "What brass balls! You little fuck, how dare you!" But I'm not going to say anything, because he's a child, an infant. Besides, my order's in, I've paid, what the hell is he gonna do?
"Sorry, my friend, I thought you two were together, I didn't mean to cut in front of you" and I say it good 'n' specific so he gets my meaning. Now, I'm not proud or anything, but the kid backs off and says "O.K., as long as you didn't do it on purpose." And I'm thinking, this is a kid who's either going to become an attorney or a politician, he doesn't give a crap what anyone thinks,he's gonna barge into a situation and take what he wants and piss on anyone who doesn't like it. And that's if he doesn't go back to the old country on vacation and step on a landmine and get his skin blown off.
And I think that's sad. But at least I got him before he could get me. I never enjoyed a Whopper sandwich so much in my life.
Ralph Tetta
Rochester, NY
